Well she'd better lift her game because longweekend and Iamtheman are outdoing her in the joke and lack of fact department.
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Skippy, what 'facts' would you me to provide mate?

iam, it seems you may have lost a little "want"?
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No, i think i lost some 'like'.

Btw, anyone who wonders what Economics has to do with Politics and both have to do with the future, you may like, want or need a discussion with Bill Clinton!

Attracted to the Economic Dark Side

We are where we are. Growing debt. Costs of mandatory social programs is almost equal to government income – and growing rapidly.


Fiscal control cannot be gained without major revamping of these social programs.


The above graph courtesy of David A. Rosenberg, Chief Economist & Strategist, Gluskin Sheff shows the percentage of the budget being consumed by mandatory expenditures.

Even if the budget could be balanced, the government would need to pull over $1 trillion per year or 10% out of the economy next year either through taxes or program cuts. This is a recipe for depression. It would initiate a reinforcing downward spiral – less economic activity, government spending reduced to match, economic activity down because of less government spending, another reduction in government spending, etc. And this is not the 1930's and 1940's where a huge potential could be unleashed to grow the economy out of debt.

We are in the no win scenario. Logic tells you that the economic future is grim based on the economic rules we know and understand.
Link -
http://seekingalpha.com/article/210875-attracted-to-the-economic-dark-side?sourc...
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I will leave you to read the balance of the article, which is quite lengthy.

US could be broke in 15 years: economist

One of the world's most eminent experts on public finance says the west is headed for a fiscal crisis of the state, and the United States will be broke within 15 years unless it addresses its unsustainable budget deficit.

Professor Alan J. Auerbach from the University of California, Berkeley, who is director of the Burch Centre for Tax Policy and Public Finance, says western nations must raise taxes and cut spending to meet the huge financial burden of an ageing population.

Yet to do so now risks destabilising the global recovery.

Professor Auerbach is in Sydney for a conference hosted by the Australian School of Taxation and the Institute of Chartered Accountants.

He says G20 leaders face an unenviable task as they prepare to meet in Canada.

"They have a bit of a high wire act going on here. The problem is that the economies in the US and Europe are so weak as the result of the recession and there's a general view of economists that withdrawing stimulus could be dangerous," he said.

"On the other hand, the events in Greece and Spain and other countries have made forcefully evident the need for these countries, as well as countries like the United States and the G20, to make significant fiscal adjustments in the near future.

"The best of all possible worlds would be to maintain fiscal stimulus in the short run while simultaneously making credible policy actions now that will make fiscal adjustments occur in the not-too-distant future."

However, Professor Auerbach says those two actions are contradictory and impossible to implement simultaneously.

"That's impossible and that's the problem. On the one hand you have some people in Europe, for example in Germany, moving toward immediate fiscal consolidation," he explained.

"You have the United States not doing so and frankly, a country that takes only expansionary fiscal actions now and says it will do something about its long-term problems some time in the future, is not very credible in that claim.

He says one problem is the unpopularity of any US moves to reduce its deficit.

"The Obama Administration is bending to political reality in the United States which, at the moment, is unaccepting of the need for fiscal consolidation," he added.

He also describes as "pretty absurd" the position of the 'Tea Party' movement, which is strenuously resisting any potential tax increases.


Broke in 15 years

Professor Auerbach's research over recent years has highlighted how increasingly unsustainable the United States' public finances have become.

"The United States, at the Federal level, has raised a fairly stable share of GDP and taxation, typically around 18 or 19 per cent. On the other hand spending has been rising very steadily and it's projected to continue rising, to a large extent because of our expenditures on what we call entitlement programs - large government transfer programs for old-age pensions and for medical care," he explained.

"These costs are rising in the United States. They're rising in other developed countries as well, both because of the rising cost of medical care and the increasing share of the population that's elderly. And these costs will continue to grow even with measures that the US and other countries are undertaking to adjust these."

He says that raises a serious prospect that the world is headed for a fiscal crisis that extends beyond Greece, Spain and the other heavily indebted European nations.

"Something has to happen to alleviate that risk and may happen but it'll require a lot of courage from politicians," he warned.

"Under current projections, the United States debt to GDP ratio will reach an all time high within the next 15 years. That is it'll be higher than the debt as a share of national income that we left World War II with.

"Unlike, in 1946 though, when we didn't have very significant fiscal commitments and were able to start reducing our debt very rapidly, the US in 15 years will be in no position to stop accumulating debt.

"So we're heading toward an unsustainable level of debt in 15 years, capital markets presumably will look ahead and understand that and not let us get to the end of that 15 year period."

In the worst scenario, he says America could face the same problems that Greece is experiencing where capital markets basically go on strike and refuse to fund the debt.

"We do not have 15 years. The capital markets will react sooner. The US may have a little bit more time than another country in a similar situation as long as the dollar is the currency that people hold and that investors flee to when there's general turmoil in financial markets," he cautioned.

"The US will have a little bit more flexibility and time to respond but this time is not limitless and we will have to respond in a fairly short number of years."

He does not think the US is alone. When asked what other countries may be in a similar fiscal position, Professor Auerbach responded: "Virtually all the developed countries, certainly in Europe."
Link -
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/06/22/2933526.htm
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The prof is right, but he is also wrong.

The USA & Global economy is heading for trouble, but it won't take 15 years to get here!

Clearly, the time has come to acknowledge that exponential polarisation of income, wealth, opportunity and power is what inevitably precipitates socio-economic and environmental disasters - and to reverse the dangerous trends of REGRESSIVE and inequitable: taxation and evasion/avoidance, WEALTHfare and sanctioning exclusive foreign tax havens at the expense of the majority...

Unfortunately, the restorative advantages of PROGRESSIVE taxation have been largely ignored by post-GFC budget reformists to date...

NOTHING GROWS FOREVER

BASIC BIOLOGY!

LOOK AT THE POPULATION CURVE!!

Addicted to oil … and to economic growth

While the massive oil spill catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico is demonstrative of our addiction to oil, it is also the latest example of modern capitalism’s addiction to economic growth.

For the last two centuries, Western economic theory has been based on the untenable proposition and requirement that economies must (and can) grow at substantial rates, indefinitely.

Especially for the last hundred years or so, abundant and inexpensive fossil fuels have allowed an unprecedented rate of economic growth that has brought Americans and much of the rest of the developed world a previously unimaginable, but unfortunately unsustainable materialistically-based standard of living.

By its very nature, an economic system based on constant and inexorable dynamic growth contains the seeds of its own demise. Indeed, capitalism as it is practiced today in America and Europe has become the proverbial anchor that will send us all to the bottom if we can’t find the thoughtfulness and courage to devise a new path forward.

Because of the system’s constant drive for unsustainable growth and desire for excessive profits, humanity has reached a most precarious “tipping” point. Simply stated, it is greed and the belief that profits must be acquired at all costs that have led to the lack of sufficient and effective regulation and oversight that has allowed both the financial meltdown and tragic Gulf oil spill to occur.

Like the giant global Ponzi schemes that characterized the recent financial collapse, a capitalism that puts profits above everything else, and that is based on an unending supply of cheap energy, is doomed to fail. At some point the chickens will come home to roost. Unfortunately, that time has come.

Like it or not, we are faced with no alternative but to change our ways. With Peak Oil at hand, other finite natural resources being depleted at unprecedented rates, overpopulation, a devastating decrease in crucial biodiversity, and the ongoing fossil fuel-caused fouling of our planet, it is inescapable that now is the moment for a new and sustainable course to be charted.

Make no mistake, the changes that will be required are immense and will no doubt come with much pain and dislocation for many. But the future is not hopeless. It will, however, most certainly demand a paradigm shift away from profits-driven growth to something some have called “green growth.”

In addition, surviving in the future will mean more staying at home, working locally and utilizing local resources. There will be more locally grown food and farmers markets, more public transportation; and we’ll need to maximize efficiency and conservation. Everything we produce will need to be fully recyclable and bio-degradable. Food production, while becoming more local, will also need to become organic. Using chemical fertilizers and pesticides and factory farming is simply not healthy, and even more importantly, isn’t sustainable.

Perhaps just as important as changing the way we produce our energy and food, and transport ourselves around, are the needs to transform our politics and the way our corporations function. Corporations can no longer be allowed to possess human rights, but not be required to manifest human responsibility. If corporations are not required to add social justice and ecological responsibility to their existing shareholder mandate to provide profits, then the future for civilization will be dark indeed.

Finally, if any of the above necessary changes are to occur, our politics and democracy must be reborn in a way that reduces the corrupting role and influence of money in deciding the outcomes of elections. Only then will the public interest achieve its deserved exalted status above the private interests epitomized by the corporate greed and profits that so predominate today.

Some will say the above-described scenario for a sustainable and livable future is hopelessly naïve and utopian. On the contrary, what is truly utopian is to believe that we can continue to grow and use our finite resources indefinitely. Now that is the definition of naivety.

Link -
http://www.barnstablepatriot.com/home2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id...
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I agree with the majority of the above article!